Tag: Games

Pacific Drive Review

When you really like something, you think about it a lot. And as you think about it, you discover lots of little gripes that prevent it from being more perfect. Those issues, when discussed, might make it seem like you don’t like the thing, but actually they are a symptom of liking it so much. So just to be clear before I begin, I really like Pacific Drive.

Pacific Drive is a game with a slippery genre. It’s mainly a survival game, with a flavour of horror and elements of rogue-like and extraction looter. The narrative is a science fiction mystery that runs like a radio play. The gameplay loop sees you head out into a mysterious “Zone” in search of answers, salvation and – mainly – loot as you desperately try to keep your trusty station wagon running to the end of this journey and into the next.

The loop itself is a near-perfect execution of the standard survival formula. Drive out into the hazardous world to find resources that allow you to make better equipment so you can get more resources when you head out the next time. So when you get back you can build better equipment and blah blah blah. When done well, as here, the repetition is addictive with each new addition to your survival arsenal providing impetus to head back out and try it. Pacific Drive provides a variety of interesting and unique options to increase your range in the Zone, and also your chances of survival.

The star of the show is the car itself, which functions as a character in its own right. Some of the highlights of the game are in the nervy early stages as you try to keep the car limping on – patching tyres, siphoning dregs of fuel – until the end of the current run. I found our mutual dependence nurtured a distinct affinity for the car. I looked after it and it looked after me.

Unlike more purist survival games such as Minecraft or Rust, Pacific Drive offers a narrative to provide the motivation for continued missions into The Zone. The developer, Ironwood studios, deserve tremendous credit here for the effort that has been put into the worldbuilding. Every item has flavour text in addition to hundreds of text and audio files that create a vibrant universe with a well-defined style. To nitpick, it falls a little too close to the sci-fi-wackiness-meets-modern-bureaucracy of the SCP stories and, most notably, 2019’s Control.

The main narrative itself is delivered as live and recorded radio transmissions. Themes include the role of science, faith, commitment, obsession and sacrifice. It is interesting enough and supplements the already enjoyable gameplay loop, but occasionally feels a bit less profound than it thinks it is. For instance, the trope of woman wanting a baby but putting career first is very much in effect here. Not exactly groundbreaking. In several key places the narrative beats don’t quite land, and in my view the silent protagonist just doesn’t work. The player has no control over the story, and even the player character has very little involvement, generally just hearing events tangentially linked to your actions play out. All of this creates a feeling of listening to a radio-play than a meaningful interactive story with at least the illusion of agency. None of this is helped by the fact the key parts of the narrative can be playing out while you desperately repair a failed engine or drive out of the jaws of danger.

Visually, Pacific Drive is stylised but fairly flawless and oozing atmosphere. The game could be compared to Outer Wilds in its semi-cartoon portrayals of nature and technology. It has a consistent aesthetic design which complements the narrative style and worldbuilding, and is regularly downright beautiful. The chaos and tension can be suddenly punctuated by moments of peace: the headlights go off and you are left with fireflies glowing over a vast alien pond; a lightning strike illuminates a rain-drenched plain.

The UI fits the style of 1970’s computer technology well, but is confusing at the best of times and downright overwhelming at first. In many places Pacific Drive is about choice – should I build part X or part Y? – but sometimes the fact that those options are available is hidden across multiple menus and systems. This combines with a slightly weak tutorial that is split between voice-over vaguely pointing you in the right direction and text instruction. The result is a downright messy introduction to the systems. There were multiple upgrade paths and systems that I never knew were there or forgot. In other instances, I failed runs into the Zone because I had misunderstood how the map works, or headed into a region in search of a particular resource that was specifically not available there, but I had missed that in the small print. Perhaps a case of style over substance.

My principle criticism overall is that the game was too easy. Firstly, much of the game’s peril lies in the unknown – which is initially everything. The dark corners of The Zone are filled with creeping horrors offering unknown threats. Is this mannequin going to chase me down and eat me? Will this toxic cloud melt off my skin? And indeed, much of the first chunk of the game I spent darting out to snatch up a handful of loot before a frantic dash to the relative safety of the car. However, as you see more of these dangers on your repeated trips you learn how to deal with them, which in many cases render them barely an inconvenience. What once sent me recoiling in horror is ignored and avoided with a flick of the joystick.

The darkness is literally and figuratively illuminated because as your knowledge increases, so do your tools. These also reduce the threat from the hazards of The Zone, leading to a precipitous drop in the feeling of danger and something moving toward confidence. Even the dreaded instability that closes in at the end of each area – at first an urgent threat to be breathlessly outrun – turns out not to move that fast, and doesn’t do that much damage even when it arrives. That is not to say the car makes its return to the base (the so-called Auto Shop) in tip-top shape, and a key part of the loop is making your repairs and improvements back at The Shop. However, it was very rare to feel like the run was at risk of failure.

(If one was being generous, they could argue that making the game easier as you learn more aligns with some of the themes of science and enlightenment, but frankly that’s a bit of a stretch and feels more like imbalance.)

It should be said that I play games very conservatively, prioritising safety and resource management over speed and flair. If anything, this highlighted the fact that I could make progress in the game without taking too many risks. The only essential upgrades were the ones that allowed the car to make longer journeys, necessary in the mid- and late-game. Everything else offered convenience rather than an essential, and the player could make do without. There was nothing forcing an Anxious Andy like me to push it to the limit in hopes of some fabulous reward.

(This of course could lead to a wider discussion about whether it is possible to “play a game wrong”, and maybe I was in this instance, but that’s an article for another time)

A couple of final minor gripes. The game has some fantastic licensed music – playing out of the in-car radio – that is so well-suited and matches the rest of the excellent vibe, but needed double the number of tracks. I think every song was well-chosen, but I never wanted to hear them again by the end of my time. And then, after all of this game that relies on voice-over, sound effects and music – I reached the end of my epic journey and the credits played in silence. This genuinely felt like a bug, and if not was a missed opportunity to provide a denouement with style and atmosphere.

In the end, I really enjoyed Pacific Drive and was excited every time I booted it up. Though comparisons to Outer Wilds were overblown – it never reached the heights of discovering [REDACTED] on the Quantum Moon – its weaknesses were more than compensated by the enthralling gameplay loop and fantastically executed style.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order Review

I came to Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order as a refugee from Assassin’s Creed Valhalla having been disappointed with its floaty, contactless combat. SWJ:FO did not leave me disappointed.

Star Wars Jedi: Fallen Order is an action-adventure game in the vein of Dark Souls. It is characterised by crisp, precise combat and sometimes gruelling enemies. Fallen Order has been on my radar for the year since its release and building a new PC has given me a chance to get around to it. Additionally, it can be obtained through the EA Play program for a quarter of its RRP.

Fallen Order reveals its world in a thrilling and visually stunning opening sequence. We’re introduced to our jedi-in-hiding hero who is swept into a narrative larger than himself. The first thing that jumped out at me in FO was the combat. It’s responsive and specific in a way that I had really been looking for. It takes some time to get a handle on (I played on the second-highest difficulty) but your successes truly feel well-earned. This, of course, is a double-edged lightsaber (?) and means you run into some tough enemies (a la Dark Souls) that can end you in one hit. Or more frustratingly, lock you into an inescapable cycle of blows until you are finally, frustratingly, ended.

As he proceeds our Hero Cal Kestis is adorned with extra force abilities that add to the jedi power fantasy. They serve to enhance platforming, unlock new areas and add depth to combat; certainly on the harder difficulties your new skills are an absolute necessity for crowd control and big bosses.

Proceeding a few hours into the game it became clear that the story in Fallen Order isn’t your usual, cut-and-paste good versus evil tale. The characters have shades of grey and compelling motives. I found myself interested in the turns of the story in a way that I have found in few video games. SWJ:FO features some fan-service which, while expected, generated nostalgia that I didn’t see coming. There’s a lot to look out for for fans of the Clone Wars/Purge era of Star Wars history.

Much like its Metroid forebears, Fallen Order has a scanning mechanic which adds flavour to the world. I really enjoyed the details of the flora and fauna of the planets, specifically the ones that aren’t out to kill you. I didn’t read them all, but they fleshed out the world and made it feel alive and lived in. I was a little disappointed with some of the more narrative scans, which tell stories of events that have taken place in that location. You can usually track a parallel narrative as you move through a level, but in general these were fairly lightweight.

The game is set across a handful of planets and has you return to them repeatedly, your newfound skills now granting access to previously barred zones. On the surface this didn’t appeal but there is something satisfying in returning to a previously explored area with fresh eyes. The map is brimming with things to collect, providing improvements both cosmetic and mechanical. I cared more than usual for the cosmetics in the game, which provide a layer of customisability and variation to Cal and his little robot buddy BD-1. Nevertheless, my main interest in the collectibles were the ones that made Cal a stronger Jedi. Here I found myself a little frustrated: the map does show how many collectibles are left to be found in a zone, but the map itself is messy, hard to read and does not show you precisely where the collectibles are. As much as I like the upgrades I’m hardly going to return to a location for the fourth time just to look in every nook and cranny.

Fallen Order looks awesome. Having just come from the clay figurine faces of Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, the characters look and move in an impressively realistic way. The landscapes are some of the most epic I’ve ever seen in a game but equally each nameless corridor has been lovingly created with production value you would expect from a Star Wars product. The music is perfect, swelling at the right moments and giving you the little flute trills characteristic of the series. Overall a smashing presentation.

In summary, SWJ:FO is the full package. It controls beautifully, it looks amazing and has a story with appeal both to newcomers and fans of the series.

Top 5 Games of the Year 2018

It’s that time of year again.

Honourable mention: Red Dead Redemption II.

Holy Moly. Say what you want about RDRII, that game is a hell of a thing. In terms of scale, attention to detail and sheer quality it is unparalleled. It is really a sight to behold. The problem with RDRII, in the end, is that it just wasn’t that fun. Unlike this year’s fantastic Spiderman, the moment-to-moment action in Red Dead II was simply tiresome and dull. Yes, the story was great, the voice-acting was spot-on, the shooting was fun. The bits in between – as in, the majority of the game – were not fun. When it came down to it I think I resented Red Dead II for not respecting my time. I felt like I was constantly having a hypothetical argument with the Houser brothers, where I wept for the 50th time “Why can’t I just fast-travel there?!” and Dan Houser spits back through gritted teeth “Because you’re going to fucking ride a horse for ten minutes instead”

5. PlayerUnkown’s Battlegrounds

It’s back. Flying against the rules of my top 5 list that I made up, I am including the same game two years running. PUBG was my game of the year last year and it has remained such a constant feature in my life that it has to make the list again.

The ongoing criticisms of PUBG are well-documented and as I approach 1000 hours of playtime I am not going to argue with them. The netcode can be bad. The microtransactions are shitty. The performance is spotty. But the core mechanics of the gameplay are so damn good.

There is something about the long periods of peace, frantic moments of violence and satisfying shooting mechanics that keeps me (and my friends) coming back to PUBG. It has to be said that I would not be so keen on the game if I didn’t have a close group of friends still playing it – but that fact it has kept us all so hooked is testament to the game in itself.

Further in the defense of PUBG Corp, they have made a concerted effort to appease fans this year with the Fix PUBG campaign and the release of a huge update in December. The new snow map has proved a big hit with the community (and me) and PUBG‘s concurrent player count once again surpassed one million. Despite fierce market competition from the likes of Fortnite and Black Ops among many others, PUBG is not out of the battle royale just yet.

4. Into The Breach

Released early in the year on PC and more recently on Switch, Into The Breach has proven to be a huge success. From the makers of FTL, Into The Breach is a turn based strategy puzzle game that pits teams of mechs against alien insects.

The most remarkable thing about ITB to me is just how solvable many of the predicaments you find yourself in are. If you stare at the field of battle long enough, you can frequently find a way out of the seemingly hopeless state you have gotten yourself into. You might have to accept some damage here or sacrifice a city to the Vek there, but you can get out of it (most of the time).


ITB really makes decisions feel meaningful and impactful and encourages – or rather, insists upon – sacrifice and compromise in order to move forward. It is satisfying and frustrating in just the right ratio and gives you the feeling of being a strategic battle commander in both ways – when you lose, you know it’s your fault but when you win, it’s you (and not the roll of a dice) that made it happen.

3. Spiderman

The swinging in Spiderman is excellent. This is a really important point because it makes up most of the game. If you like the swinging, you will probably like this game and it feels truly majestic to move around Manhattan this way. Unlike the ponderous RDRII, every moment of Spiderman is good fun.

The combat has come in for criticism for being Arkham-lite, and that may be fair. Nevertheless, I found it to be enjoyable, strategic and generally what one would expect from an arachnid superhero.

I found the story relatively luke-warm but for me the sheer joy in every moment of Spiderman got it easily onto this list.

2. God of War

The hype for God of War was one of the reasons I bought a PS4 earlier this year. The console did not disappoint, and neither did GoW.

The axe mechanic – which can be thrown and recalled by magic at any time – is enough for GoW to score highly, but in addition to that there are breathtaking visuals, an intricately designed world and a relatively in-depth loot system.

Despite the criticism God of War received for lack of female representation, I think the game should be praised for its portrayal of the difficult aspects of masculinity and the nature of the father-son relationship. Sure, it may be a little clumsy at times but the game makes good use of voice-acting, cut-scenes and game mechanics to develop the relationship between Kratos and Atreus to make a truly compelling story.

After completing the game I took great pleasure (and a little frustration) in beating all the Valkyries, which added many hours to the game and is an indisputable marker of the good time I was having.

1. Horizon: Zero Dawn

So H:ZD didn’t actually come out this year, but I played it for the first time in 2018 and was so blown away that it not only made the list – it made the top of the list. Horizon swept in and became one of my favourite games of all time. H:ZD is Dutch studio Guerilla games’ first attempt at the open-world genre and their fresh and unique approach has produced a very fine contribution to the field.

The first thing that stands out is the combat mechanics. The game revolves around fighting various kinds of robot animals – from ostriches to dinosaurs. The player gradually acquires a variety of weapons to take on these cybernetic beasts and the range available keeps the fights fresh, fun and strategic. It is possible to just brute force your way through the encounters, but much more satisfying to scan the creature for weaknesses and use the most appropriate weapon to achieve the most devastating results (which could be a catastrophic explosion, the removal of a limb or freezing). It is by far the most engaging combat mechanic I have ever seen in an open world game.

I must also highlight the story in Horizon, which could easily stand alone as a book or film. Guerilla opted for the conventional open-world technique of drip-feeding narrative through written and audio logs interspersed with cut-scenes. The characters are compelling, mysterious and supplemented by on-the-mark voice-acting, with the fantastic protagonist Aloy chief among them. I was keen to seek out every available audio log to find out more about the world.

The open-world of H:ZD is densely-populated and beautiful. Sun-scorched deserts give way to verdant forests, all in a vibrant and varied colour pallet. Tribal hunting parties roam the dangerous wilderness and well-developed side quests are ever-present. In harmony with the story-telling Guerilla have built something that feels very like a living world.

Of course, nothing is perfect and H:ZD is no different. The inventory management is clumsy at best and off-puttingly overwhelming at worst. However, the flaws in Horizon only serve to underline the potential for a sequel that builds on the strong foundation that the first game started. Here’s hoping for some news on a follow-up in 2019.

The Joy of Travel (in Videogames)

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There is something comforting about being “in transit”. I like being on buses and trains and planes and just being conveyed from one place to another. You can sit back, relax and watch the world go by. “I like the peace/ In the backseat”, as Arcade Fire put it.

I think the main reason is that you’re not really expected to be doing anything else when you’re travelling. I’ve never had to commute long distances, Leeds-to-London-style, so I’ve never been obliged to do work on a train. For me it has generally been for leisure and therefore I can spend the travel-time as I please; a welcome retreat in a world of constant stimulation and distraction.

My first recollection of having a similar feeling in a game was in my excitement for the release of Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles. I liked the idea of me and my chums hunkering down in our caravan and journeying from one adventure to the next – even though I was aware that that would actually make a pretty boring game and the fun itself revolved around the bits in between the travelling. I liked the concept nevertheless.

This was brought to mind in the time I’ve spent this week with Supergiant’s new game, Pyre, which offers the familiar opportunity to lead a mismatched bunch of companions on a caravan-based foray. Pyre actually offers a bit more time inside the caravan than FF:CC, albeit only while the caravan is stationary (I don’t quite get the same cosy feeling if the vehicleisn’t moving).  Still, the game captures the excitement of a travelling adventure quite admirably.

Some of this feeling is even captured in open-world games such as The Elder Scrolls Series, where one experiences the quiet anticipation of setting a distant waypoint and journeying through the wilderness to reach it.

Ultimately I suppose travel is a fundamental part of being human, harking back to our ancient nomadic routes. This is underlined by other art forms, which frequently employ the “travel tale” as part of their narrative to inspire a feeling of wonder in the audience (The Lord of The Rings, On the Road, Heart of Darkness). I’m happy to see Pyre using this technique in its unique graphic-novel-esque setting and hope to see more games packing me up in a wagon and sending me off to war.

Mario Kart 8 Deluxe- Impressions

As a day-one Switch adopter, Breath of the Wild kept me interested for about 70 hours and I loved playing the console handheld, on-the-go. I was disappointed with Zelda’s lack of end-game content, however, and left wishing I had something else to play on my shiny new console. Enter MK8D.

Everything about Mario Kart radiates quality, craft and fun. The game looks stunning, and is incredibly easy to pick up and play. I quickly set to work attempting to get gold on all of the Grand Prix, which up to the Mirror Cup was challenging but not overwhelming. 200cc mode was whole other beast, and many of the cups took several (many) attempts. All of it was thoroughly enjoyable.

In comparison to my previous experiences with Mario Kart games, MK8D feels fairer. It is still frustrating to be blue-shell’d, but knowing there are ways to avoid it mitigates this considerably. Items can be used to repel the blue shell, and letting an opponent cruise into first place only to get nuked from above is extremely satisfying. Similar goes for red shells and other obstacles in the game. Ultimately it feels more like a game of skill.

This has been evident through the online play as well, in which I have seen my ranking slowly improve as I gained skill and finesse. Again, nothing seems unfair and the consistency of the top players within a tournament indicates that the role of luck is minimal. Furthermore on the online play, the netcode seems good once in-game with little to no lag and generally good performance. I have been kicked from pre-game lobbies more than a few times though.

My main criticism of MK8D is that after around 15 hours I have gold in all the cups (unlocking the Gold Mario character) and feel unsure what else there is to do. More gold equipment can be unlocked by getting 3 stars in all the cups, which sounds like much more of an ordeal than it is worth. I still need to investigate Time Trial mode which could reveal some more addictive challenges, but (while fun) I don’t feel compelled to go back to the online mode. Hopefully MK8D has something to hook me back in lest I return to my wanderings in the Switch release schedule wasteland.

PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds – Impression

After seeing a Quick Look on everyone’s favourite videogame entertainment site GiantBomb, I knew PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (henceforth referred to affectionately as PUBG) was a game I would like very much. I struggled to justify the expense on an early access game, but succumbed one lonely evening. And I did not regret it.

The streams of PUBG fail to express the sheer intensity of the experience, especially when playing solo and especially when you’re new to the game. Every sound spawns terrified jamming of keys while trying to go prone. I am a particularly jumpy person and this can be embarrasing when dead team-mates (more on squad play later) are spectating my play and see my view leap up and down again when a gunshot rings out. Despite being in early access it’s clear that PUBG neatly walks the fine line between the thrill of looting, the fear of being shot, and the sadism of ending another player’s round in a bloody haze.

I was fortunate to notice friends also playing on Steam (not surprising since everyone is playing at the moment) and was quickly able to form a regular squad. The game takes on a slightly different tone when playing as a group of up to four, the abject fear of a lonely death replaced with considerations of strategy, positioning, resource management and not humiliating yourself in a more public way. The best way to describe squad play in PUBG is to say it is the best game that I have ever experienced at replicating children playing soldiers. You get to shout “Moving to cover!”, “Reloading!”, “Check my six!” and other such pseudo-militaristic jargon in a non-ironic way that actually means something in the game. It’s cool.

Frustrations are definitely present, however, particularly for those of us who are not very good at shooting. I find myself regularly able to get into the top 15 or 10 living players, only to be deftly outgunned by more skilled opponents. This is not unfair, but it’s vexing that the only practice I get at PUBG’s shooting is in a live fire situation. One cannot help but feel that you’re in the ever-closing circle with 12-hour-a-day streamers, but I’ve got a day job. Some kind of training or deathmatch mode would definitely be appreciated.

Despite this, I have definitely spent a lot of time thinking about PUBG recently and am keen to see its development in the coming months. More on this to follow, probably.